The roofing company that you ultimately hire should be able to demonstrate their academic and professional skills, along with a proper license for their roofing company name and your specific location. You should ask if the employees have factory or industry training for the job you are hiring them for, e.g. metal roof, tile roofs. A legitimate roofing company will not balk at providing proof of insurance, proof of license and proof of any other certifications they may possess. If the roofer you are speaking with is evasive, hesitates or tells you they do not have these documents with them, do not hire them. Period.

Insurance for a roofing company is a biggie. Accidents happen, even with the most experienced roofing companies. Those accidents could cost you big-time if the roofer you hired is uninsured, or under insured. For instance, If a worker gets hurt, if your house is roofed incorrectly, if they accidentally damage a neighbor’s property or your property like a vehicle. These are all instances that could land you in court; having to pay for an attorney as well as damages. So I would say that verifying the insurance of a roofing company is one of your primary goals.

The next thing you want to consider is the overall cost of hiring the roofing company. If their quote is too high, or if their quote is too low, there may be a problem with this quote from this specific roofing company. If the quote is too low; did they leave something out? If it is too high, did they find something the other roofing company may have missed? All of your quotes should be within a few hundred dollars, at least under a thousand.

If not, you need to speak with each roofing company again and find the discrepancy. This could be a good thing, as one roofing company may have found a problem that the other’s missed. Or, it could be that they are padding the bill, which could leave you holding the bill if the insurance company only pays a portion of their estimate.

The reputation of the roofing contractor is another critical thing to look at. If you want to know if the roofing services of the prospective contractor are widely accepted as satisfactory you will need to take your time to read all of the reviews and testimonials from prior customers who have worked with this roofing company in the past. Their website, Google and Yelp are great places to start to see past reviews of their roofing services. Caution though, not all roofing contractors are web geniuses.

Meaning, they could be excellent roofer and just not be set up online to capture reviews from their past customers (this is actually quite common). If this is the case, and all of your other check points look good, ask the roofing company for some references. If they are unable, or unwilling to give these to you, we suggest that you walk away.